Zhang Yimou’s ‘Flowers of War’ Sumptuous But Lacks Subtlety

British actor Christian Bale (L) and Chinese director Zhang Yimou attend the premiere of "The Flowers of War" in Beijing December 11, 2011. Zhang, one of China's best-known directors, is banking on heartthrob Bale to help boost the country's chances of winning an Oscar, with his latest film on a tragic chapter in the nation's history.

Leading Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou is hoping to hit it big in China and globally with his new film, "The Flowers of the War" (金陵十三钗). The question is, can he do it?

Featuring Hollywood star Christian Bale, "The Flowers of the War" is China's Academy Award entry for best foreign language film and tackles subject matter familiar within China: Japan's brutal occupation of China’s southern city of Nanjing in 1937.

Chinese audiences may be drawn to the film for that reason, but it’s also sumptuously shot, rolling out Hollywood-like special effects with a plot that pulls no emotional punches.

The movie, which opens on Friday in China and a week later in the U.S., centers on a character named John Miller, played by Mr. Bale, who is a dissolute American mortician arrived in Nanjing to bury the town’s catholic priest. He finds salvation attempting to rescue an unlikely assortment of Chinese schoolgirls and local prostitutes sheltering in the cathedral from the horror of the Japanese occupation.

Mr. Zhang’s portrayal of the Japanese brutality leaves little to the imagination. Nuanced treatment of the Chinese characters is in stark contrast with portrayal of the Japanese as monochrome monsters. At one point, a Japanese soldier chasing the Chinese schoolgirls through the cathedral shouts: ‘Lieutenant come up here, we’ve got virgins!”

That might play well with the home crowd. But playing to nationalist sentiment in China risks alienating the wider foreign audience that Zhang is presumably angling for by placing an American at the center of the action. Chinese director Jiang Wen’s critically acclaimed "Devils on the Doorstep" was presented mainly in black and white, but still brought more nuanced color to its treatment of the Japanese occupation.

When asked if the story may come across as a nationalistic piece propping up China, Mr. Bale said he has never viewed it as such. "That would be a bit of a knee-jerk reaction,” Mr. Bale said. “This is a historical piece.”

Mr. Zhang’s film, which jumps nimbly between English, the Nanjing dialect of Chinese, and occasional barks of Japanese, clearly attempts to appeal to global audiences and is part of a global push from China to create a homegrown film industry that can rival Hollywood’s.

China wants to create production and distribution companies big enough to compete with U.S. film giants like Warner Bros. and Sony Pictures. The government believes that if China becomes a major player in the global film industry it will help to export the country's culture and soften its image overseas.

Mr. Bale said he’s not attempting to bridge the divide between the Chinese film market and America’s. “Leave it up to the businessmen to decide if China and Hollywood can become a single market in the future,” Mr. Bale said. “I just thought this would be a good opportunity.”

Mr. Zhang and Mr. Bale both say they are not focused on the business side of movie-making and are artists who are more focused on the craft of fine story-telling and the art of cinematography.

But with one of the most sensitive episodes in recent Chinese history at its center, and with a first screening taking place in a government building in the center of Beijing, it is the politics, rather than the cinematography, that will draw the most attention.

Zhang, the director who choreographed the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics, has already come under fire for cozying up to the communist regime and their partial view of China’s troubled history. "The Flowers of War" will likely do little to alter that reputation.

Big-budget "Flowers of War" is the latest film from Chinese director Zhang Yimou, with Hollywood star Christian Bale in the lead role. Some critics have disparaged it as an overstated pro-China piece. Bale and Zhang answer back from the red carpet. WSJ's Angela Yeoh reports in this video: